Tag Archives: family

NOTE: The Aspie Teacher blog is the story of my family’s journey. My first blog was Geeky Science Mom’s Tumblr which I started in September 2012 and my writings gradually progressed from there. Periodically I look back over my old writings to check on the distance I have travelled in this journey that is called my life. This is one of those checks.

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I am autistic and I am also a mother of two amazing young people who are autistic as well. I am also single. My children see their father maybe two hours every week, sometimes it is less. He is not really involved in their lives. For the past four years I have been working multiple jobs to make ends meet. Somewhere in there I managed to earn my Master’s degree. I have been homeschooling/unschooling both my kids for the past three years and will continue to do so until both my kids graduate high school in another 2-3 years. It has been a challenging balancing act.

I see articles online about single parenting with autistic children. It strikes me odd how bleak the authors describe their lives. One author claims that single parents of autistic children “can’t have it all”, that they “will never be compensated financially or professionally for the thousands of hours I’ve spent over the last decade taking my son to treatments”. Other authors complain about having to give up their career, complain they can’t go on trips, complain that it was the Autism that caused the divorce, and complainabout the “grueling therapy sessions” (if they are grueling for you, how do you think your child feels?)

Parenting is hard no matter what the neurology of the child is. The reality is if you are a single parent, something has to give. You can’t expect to have everything and the reason why you “can’t have it all” has nothing to do with your child’s neurology. It really does take a village to raise a child, so when part of that village is missing, it gets that much harder.

I willingly chose to put my career on hold when I became a parent. I was fortunate enough to be able to be a stay-at-home mom for five years. At the time, my husband had a good paying full-time job with benefits. Being a single income family lead to finances being really tight, and we lived in a small duplex, but it was worth it. The only time I was a home owner was when both my ex and I were working so we could afford amortgage. As a single parent, I am a renter once again. This time, my rental is even smaller than the one we lived in back when my children were babies. Housing costs are higher and there is a housing shortage where we live.

My children have weekly counseling visits and my daughter has weekly occupational therapy (OT) sessions (something she personally asked for). We live in a rural area. Services are in another county all together. We are on the road a lot and I am fortunate enough to have the type of employment that allows me to take my children to their appointments. I have never put my children through “grueling therapy sessions” and I never will. Applied Behavior Analysis (AB A) sessions, which is considered the go-to treatment for Autism, are anywhere from 25 to 40 hours per week for 12 months a year for at least 2 years with sessions typically provided in 2-3 hours blocks. I spent threehours observing an ABA session in June 2015 as a requirement for my Master’s degree program. It was horrible –Initial Reaction to ABA Observation.

My divorce finalized on June 23, 2014, but we had separated in October 2012. We tried to get back together after being apart for three years. Our attempt lasted a year and a half. My ex just doesn’t want the responsibility of a family. It has almost been five years since we first separated and I have not tried dating. I have had to let myself grieve. Looking through my old writings, I see many blogs that focused on sadness and grief. I have had to allow myself to process those emotions. I have also had to be present for my children. They have been grieving, too. There was no room for romance in that. I have to allow my heart to heal before I can allow anyone else in. I am still healing. Everyone grieves differently and the time it takes to adequately heal is different for everyone. When youhave been in an abusive situation, it can take even longer to heal and you need to give yourself that time or you could very well fall into a similar situation.

[Image description: Sea green colored background with black lettering. “Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do it lean to swim.” – Vicky Harrison]

Then there is myissue of living in aduality of perception. I wrote that blog in June 2016 and it helped me realize some things about myself. When I found myself unexpectedly a single parent, I didn’t know how I was going to manage. My family isn’t in the area. I was in graduate school at the time and I was working part time. How the hell was I going to support two kids with special needs on my own!!!???!!! This thought was screaming in my head. I was so filled with fear and shock I had no time to be angry, at least not yet. My anger came later. The grief cycle is an interesting, complicated thing. As I tell my kids, a very wibbly wobbly, timey wimey sort of thing.

I never thought I would get to the point where I would even consider letting my ex back in my life, but I did and I learned a lot from that experience. I learned about letting go, something I had been really struggling with for years. As a content teacher, I didn’t think I could teach outside of Science (my area), but I found out I could. I didn’t know I could teach myself how to do basic home and car repair along with all the other family/parenting/home stuff I had been doing for years, but I found out I could. I didn’t know I could parent on my own, but I found out I could.

I learned I was autistic five and a half years ago. Both my children had been diagnosed by that time. I have learned so much since then. My life has been turned upside down and inside out, but I kept moving forward knowing that another sunrise would signal another chance for me to try again. I kept learning and adapting.

Looking back to where I was when I first became a single parent, I couldn’t really think of the future. I was in full on survival mode back then. Looking where I am now, all I can say is “wow”. I have come so far from that place where I found myself crushed, lost, and desperate just trying to make it day by day.

My journey is not complete, not in a long shot, but I find myself no longer in that place of desperation. I have found a future where I am valued and wanted. I have found a future where I have developed skills I didn’t even know I had. I have found a future where my children are seeing a future for themselves as well. I have found that my mind has a sense of ease now. I still have a lot of stress in my life, but nothing like it once was. I feel a sense of peace inside me now. Do I still cry when I am alone? Yes, my grief will take time to process. Where there was once soul crushing pain, there is now a sense of understanding and a level of acceptance of the reality of the situation. As I stated before, I had to adapt. I had to find peace on my own, and I did.

“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.”